A post shared by STEPH•TWELL (@stephtwell) on Nov 9, 2018 at 6:39am PST

After finishing seventh at the inaugural Commonwealth Half Marathon Championships in Cardiff and then claiming the runner-up spot at the Simplyhealth Great South Run 10-miler in October, the Scottish runner had hinted that her marathon debut might not be too far away, adding that her performance in Portsmouth was part of “a bigger picture”.

Those performances came after she got married to fellow runner Joseph Morwood and delayed her honeymoon in order to race for Scotland at the Commonwealth event in Wales.

“Following only a short break after the Europeans, yet celebrating my recent wedding nuptials and honeymoon, I’m interested to see how I will cope with the distance, without really throwing everything into it for my first one,” adds Twell on her decision to race the Valencia Marathon.

“With two years to the Olympics, I’m aware it is no easy task to tackle the marathon (and qualify) but I have hopes to make my best impact at Tokyo 2020 and the marathon might be one of the ways I can reach this goal.

“So Geoff and I have chosen to race the Valencia Marathon on December 2 to gain experience of the race and for me to understand what further marathon training requires.

“Geoff and I can then decide what is my best strategy ahead of the World Champs and Tokyo 2020, while still not neglecting dropping down in distance from the training the marathon will give me.

“Currently, I am training in Flagstaff for four weeks before racing in Valencia and then the plan is to take a three-week break.”

The step up in distance will also realise a long-time ambition for Twell, inspired in part by world record-holder Paula Radcliffe.

“Ever since winning the London Mini Marathon, having Paula Radcliffe as one of my early role models as well as always being able to cope with a healthy volume of training, I have had hopes to one day turn to this event and become a marathoner myself,” she says.

»See the November 15 edition of AW magazine for more from an interview with Steph Twell

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